Ethics and the Environment: An Introduction (Cambridge Applied Ethics)
Dale Jamieson
Language: English
Pages: 234
ISBN: 0521682843
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
What is the environment, and how does it figure in an ethical life? This book is an introduction to the philosophical issues involved in this important question, focussing primarily on ethics but also encompassing questions in aesthetics and political philosophy. Topics discussed include the environment as an ethical question, human morality, meta-ethics, normative ethics, humans and other animals, the value of nature, and nature's future. The discussion is accessible and richly illustrated with examples. The book will be valuable for students taking courses in environmental philosophy, and also for a wider audience in courses in ethics, practical ethics, and environmental studies. It will also appeal to general readers who want a reliable and sophisticated introduction to the field.
utilitarianism to very strong claims about the rights of animals. If what he says is correct, then it is just as wrong to kill a cow as a human being. It is not surprising that there are places in this theory where one might balk. 5.3 Using animals Humans use other animals for many different purposes. We use them in scientific experiments, in product testing, for amusement and entertainment. We care for them when they live in our homes as our companions, we 34 Regan 1983: 351. 35 Regan 1983:
unpleasant). Moreover, persons experience themselves as having such experiences. Since they see themselves as subjects that persist through time, persons can have attitudes towards their past, and desires about their future. Simple creatures also experience the world, and some of these experiences are pleasurable and others are painful. What simple creatures do not experience is themselves as experiencing the world, or themselves as having pleasurable or painful experiences. Simple creatures do
for thinking this, of which supposing that there is a causal connection between individual action and the existence of the practice is only one. Having said this, I must confess that I find it astonishing that anyone would deny that eating animals causally affects the number of animals who are slaughtered and the quality of their lives. Thus far vegetarians may look pretty good, but not in the eyes of vegans, who eat no products at all that derive from animals: no meat, cheese, eggs, or honey.
have found it attractive, and why, on reflection, most philosophers reject it. In his dictum, Leopold uses the phrase ‘biotic community’ to refer to what should be the central object of moral concern. This seems both too broad and unclear. It is too broad since it apparently includes all of the Earth’s biota; it is unclear in that it is far from obvious how this is supposed to form a community. The peanut shells left on the floor of Yankee Stadium after a baseball game are part of the Earth’s
values, broadly speaking, are those that relate to an agent’s own interests. Some question whether prudential values can count as moral values, while others think that our concern about others can be subsumed under our concern for our own interests. Whatever we may think about these controversies, there is little doubt that we value nature to a great extent for reasons relating to our present and long-term interests. It is therefore useful to begin an exploration of the value of nature by